Her tail thumped against the doorframe twice and then she headed back towards the steps and led the way down to the sidewalk, me following with a leash in one hand, a smelly shoe in the other.
At home I made quick work of cleaning the dirtied treads, then put the sneaker outside on the back patio to dry. I’d return it tomorrow morning when B and I were out for our next walk. I wasn’t worried Lior would miss it since she’d told me when we’d shared a cab that she was going to Seattle. I assumed since she was visiting her friend that she’d probably be gone at least a few days. And, thanks to some light stalking the past couple of nights, I knew she was definitely there – she’d posted a few pictures from the trip of her and her friend, and their freshly painted toenails.
Checking the time, I sat at the kitchen table – Brontë beside me in her bed – and set my timer, preparing to get back to work on my novel. Right now I was at that delicate emotional stage between “Okay, maybe this isn’t as awful as I thought it was” and “I’m a hack and I will probably never get a deal again.”
The author life was nothing if not a roller coaster ride filled with climbs, swerves, loopty-loops, and heart-stopping drops. It was a mix of constant delusions, visions of grandeur, and douses of crippling self-doubt. Throw in the inevitable bouts of imposter syndrome and weeee! Welcome to the what I liked to call the Carnival of Hell.
Wouldn’t trade it for anything. Being a writer was fun. Capital F.U.N.
When the timer dinged, I sat back, stretching my arms above my head and debating whether to do another hour of work or take a short break to eat and scroll social media for a bit. Thoughts of seeing Lior helped make the case for a break and I rose to make a snack.
A few minutes later – a plate of tortilla chips liberally layered with shredded cheese and microwaved into a gooey delicious mess beside me – I began what had become my new secret obsession in the past couple of days: finding out what famous fashion model Lior Flynn had been up to.
She had uploaded a dozen or so photos already this morning, and I paused on each one, reading the witty captions beneath.
A haughty-looking white cat with a black beauty mark glared at the camera.
“What say you, Morticia? Is this love?” the first line read.
“Die, mortal fool,” read the second line.
Next was a gorgeous looking pan containing what looked to be a rice dish, complete with pistachios, tofu, cilantro, and bell peppers. “Don’t tell me I don’t know how to cook!” the caption read. In the background was a bag advertising a well-known food delivery service company.
There was a picture of another cat, this one black and looking like he’d be right at home smoking a cigar; an image of seashells; one of a to-go cup of coffee with the word Ampersand on the side of it; and images of Lior and her friend, whom I now knew was named Addie, smiling and laughing, despite Addie’s face being heavily bruised and bandaged on the left side.
They looked like two overgrown kids having way too much fun together. A dangerous combination, as noted on another image showcasing a pile of boxes and bags from what was apparently a drunken online shopping spree.
“Oops, we did it again,” Lior had written.
Reaching the last of the images, I glanced at the section where people had commented, then how long ago she’d posted the photos. In less than eight hours she’d garnered over five hundred thousand likes and had over one hundred thousand comments.
“Fucking hell,” I said.
I had a decent following myself, but nothing like the millions she had. I imagined how many more books I’d sell if I had comparable numbers and glanced down at Brontë.
“We could give this place away. Or burn it to the ground and start from scratch.” She blinked at me and went back to sleep.
I returned my gaze to the screen and scrolled down past images I’d already seen. My text alert sounded, startling me and I jumped, my finger unintentionally pressing a button.
“Shit!” I said, staring at my laptop screen. I’d just accidentally liked the red bikini photo. “What do I do?” I asked the blonde dog at my feet. But B was no help. She merely sighed in her sleep and stretched out a leg. “Shit, shit, shit.”
To unlike or not to unlike? What was the move? What if she was online and had seen me like the image? And that one in particular? Fucking hell. I would come off like a total creeper. She’d obviously tell her friend and then there would be discussions about what a slimeball I was liking only that photo. And since we weren’t friends on the site, she’d know I had come to her page specifically and?—
I hit unlike and then sat like a statue staring at the screen, waiting for something to happen. But what? A DM from her saying, “Saw ya, loser. Stop stalking me.”
But nothing happened. There was no message. No social media police pointing their virtual fingers at me and laughing. Maybe no one had noticed and I was… in the clear?
I waited another minute and was about to close my laptop, feeling a little relieved, when a wave of curiosity I hadn’t felt in a long while swept over me.
“Don’t do it, man,” I murmured to myself as I opened the search bar and typed in a name I hadn’t in a while. “You are just a glutton for punishment today.”
Instantly my eyes were assaulted with flashy images of my ex-wife Nadia at a number of fancy events, her bright white smile and blonde highlighted hair practically blinding me at every turn. Every item of clothing she wore was vibrant in color. Every pose perfectly executed to show off some part of her toned body. Every piece of jewelry was oversized and sparking dramatically at the camera lens. She’d gotten a dog, a tiny thing she’d over-accessorized to the point of it looking more toy than real. And then there was the boyfriend. I’d never been particularly fond of Brett Harrison’s music, and as far as I knew neither had Nadia. Until she was. Or at least until she saw an opportunity and jumped, quite literally, on top of it. I stared in disgust at an image of her in a too-tight t-shirt with his name emblazoned across it, her breasts looking like they were fighting for air.
I made a strange sound in my throat and then clicked in the search engine again, a sick sort of curiosity now piquing my brain. Typing in the name of the woman I had dated before meeting Nadia, I held my breath as her feed filled my screen with similar images to the ones Nadia had posted. I closed my eyes for a moment and then returned to the search box, this time typing in the name of my high school girlfriend, Elizabeth Bristol. The first to break my heart. The one I’d thought for a long time had gotten away.
Once again the images were eerily similar to the other two women’s. Bright. Flashy. Obnoxious. And gave me an acute feeling of chaos.
I was an unstoppable moron so I typed in Lior’s name again.
